Denise Chávez is a Mexican-American/Chicana/Hispana/Frontera performance writer from Las Cruces, New Mexico.  She still lives and writes in the home she was born in.  Forthcoming in 2014 is her novel, The King and Queen of Comezón, from the University of Oklahoma Press. 

The King and Queen of Comezón is the story of a family and of an entire village, of border life and of how we fulfill our personal longings and find our way and what it means to be human on La Frontera.

Chávez is the author of the novels Loving Pedro Infante, Face of an Angel, and the short story collection, The Last of the Menu Girls. Her most recent book is A Taco Testimony: Meditations on Family, Food and Culture, a memoir in food.

Chávez is currently working on a historical book with “imprints” –fiction vignettes—called Río Grande Family, about her family in Far West Texas and New Mexico.  Chávez is the founder of The Border Book Festival, which is celebrating its 20th anniversary next year with the theme, Maíz: Honoring the Corn Mother April 25-27, 2014.

Photo of Denise Chávez by Daniel Zolinsky